Prince estate finally releasing politically charged 2010 album
After a series of deluxe reissues of three of Prince’s biggest albums of the 1980s, his estate is exciting hardcore fans with the long-awaited emergence of the previously unreleased Welcome 2 America album from 2010.
The 12-tune, politically charged album, which includes One Day We’ll All B Free and a cover of Soul Asylum’s anthem Stand Up and B Strong, will be released on July 30 via Legacy Recordings, it was announced yesterday. To trumpet this project, CBS’s 60 Minutes will offer a report on Sunday, local time, on Prince, shortly before the fifth anniversary of his death.
The deluxe version of Welcome 2 America will include a blu-ray film of a Prince concert from April 28, 2011, which was part of his 21 Nite Stand at the Forum in Los Angeles. Ledisi made a guest appearance at that show.
Yesterday, the estate released the nearly 51⁄2-minute Welcome 2 America title track on streaming services. It is a slow-burn social commentary about corporations, mass media, technology, taxes and women’s rights, among other topics. Prince says ‘‘there’s no arguing with the Book’’ and ‘‘transformation happens deep within’’. The most biting lyric: ‘‘Land of the free, home of the slave.’’ Hot Summer, a track from Welcome 2 America, was debuted on June 7, 2010, Prince’s birthday.
Two other tracks from Welcome 2 America – When She Comes and 1000 Light Years from Here – appeared on 2015’s HitnRun Phase Two, his last album before he died. Although Prince never released Welcome 2 America, it was the title of an onand-off tour from December 2010 to September 2012. He announced the tour at Harlem’s Apollo Theatre. None of the 83 shows was in the Twin Cities. His current album at the time was 20Ten, released exclusively in Europe via two UK newspapers and magazines in Germany, France and Belgium.
Meanwhile, Prince’s album The Truth, which was part of his fourCD Crystal Ball package in 1998, will be released as a single disc in a limited run for Record Store Day on June 12.